Former Deion Sanders Teammate Reveals Why He Can Coach in College Until '70 or 80'

Bobby Hebert played with Deion Sanders during the 1993 season with the Atlanta Falcons.

Josh Wilson | 14 Hours Ago

Sanders jogs on field during a Buffaloes game / Ron Chenoy-Imagn Images

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Deion Sanders is getting ready to coach in his first bowl game for the Colorado Buffaloes, set to face off against the BYU Cougars on Saturday in the Alamo Bowl. Sanders, who has been quite successful in his second season leading the Buffaloes to a 9-3 overall record, has become the subject of much speculation about his future.

Whether with merit or not, there has been a substantial amount of discussion about Sanders and the possibility of someday coaching at the NFL level.

One of his former teammates, retired quarterback Bobby Hebert, recently talked about Sanders's personality and why it could keep him in college as a successful leader there for years to come.

“When he is 70 or 80, he’ll still be able to relate to 20-year-olds,” Hebert said to The Athletic. “I would bet he’s an unbelievable recruiter.”

Hebert praised Sanders's relating skillset from during his playing days, describing how he could connect with just about anyone in the Falcons locker room regardless of background or generation.

As the college sports landscape continues to shift dramatically with NIL, causing previously successful coaches like Nick Saban to leave the game behind, it could be circumstantially advantageous for someone like Sanders.

Sanders, now 57, coaching in college for twenty more years? After the progress he's made in just two years, it's worth imagining what he could do with a longer runway.

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JOSH WILSON

Josh Wilson is the news director of the Breaking and Trending News team at Sports Illustrated. Before joining SI in 2024, he worked for FanSided in a variety of roles, most recently as senior managing editor of the brand’s flagship site. He has also served as a general manager of Sportscasting, the sports arm of a start-up sports media company, where he oversaw the site’s editorial and business strategy. Wilson has a bachelor’s degree in mass communications from SUNY Cortland and a master’s in accountancy from the Gies College of Business at the University of Illinois. He loves a good nonfiction book and enjoys learning and practicing Polish. Wilson lives in Chicago but was raised in upstate New York. He spent most of his life in the Northeast and briefly lived in Poland, where he ate an unhealthy amount of pastries for six months.